“What! the Great Head is your brother?” asked the boy.
“Yes, he is,” replied the little old man.
“Then you must know his ways and can help me to outwit him.”
“I can tell you what he eats. Huge billets of maple wood—only maple—are his favorite tid-bit.”
“And is there anything he is afraid of?” the boy inquired.
“He fears my arrows, which grow ever larger as they fly!”
First the boy worked very hard chopping a great maple tree into blocks; then he invited Great Head to a feast. But Great Head would not come.
Then the little man, his brother, crept slyly to the foot of the cliff through the long grass, and sent forth a magic arrow, which grew larger and larger as it sped toward the mark. A great noise arose, like that of a hurricane rushing through a forest. Down tumbled Great Head to the foot of the precipice, and the nine youths whom he had held captive were freed from the spell, and came joyfully home again.